The Thread Where We Are Board Game Geeks

This is how I managed to convince my ex to play, and he spent all his time trying to make his courtyard symmetrical, and somehow he won, despite generally not being very good at games.

Oltremare is okay, I think I might just be tired of free-trading games.

But I actually haven't played that many "conquer the world" type games. I'm sure there's a relevant GeekList on BGG.

Louis XIV, still.
Ingenius a bit (That wacky Knizia and his ridiculously simple ideas!)
Goldbrau, which is just the daftest, most sweetly inconsequential thing ever to play with beer and laughing when you're done with realer games, it says "the cleverest businessman wins" on the box but nothing could be further from the truth. I really like it!

http://www.somethingawful.com/index.php?a=3818

http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/4829/captainawesomeie3.jpg

Played Settlers of Catan over the weekend while in Southend with friends, and it was wicked, so yesterday I bought us a copy, too.

I miss playing Settlers of Catan.
Also, Cranium, but mostly for the blue cards that made you draw things with your eyes closed or build stuff out of clay that went moldy after a couple years.
Also, Poleconomy, because it's horribly designed so there's no way everyone playing doesn't become a millionaire, even/especially during inflation. It was probably a neo-con invention meant to bring all the fun of uncapped capitalism to the family board game, but as it's the most boring premise for a game ever (think Monopoly without any sense of charity, community chest, or housing) I doubt any little kids were ever converted.

If you like Settlers, then I would recommend Puerto Rico, made by the same people. German board games rock!

i like scrabble

Puerto Rico wasn't made by the same people (different designer, different publisher), but it is a significantly awesome game. A little tricky to learn at first but everyone I've shown it to gets the idea about halfway through the first game and ends up loving it.

Is anybody here on Little Golem?

Thanks to a random Berkeley dude liquidating his massive game collection at fire sale prices my gaming shelf is well stock for the coming winter months. Some favorites and recommendations for your game nights.

Pandemic. Four player cooperative disease eradication. It's you (and bros) vs the board. The board wins about 60% of the time. Tense and easy to teach. If you have kids there is a similar but slightly lighter game called Forbidden Island.

Dominion. A non collectible card game where all players are building their decks in real time from a shared pool of 10 kingdom cards. No two games are ever alike thanks to a randomizer deck that changes the kingdom card lineup.

Dixit. A surrealist visual improvement of Apples to Apples. Won a "game of the year" award in Germany which is kinda a big deal. Players take turns telling a story then laying down an image from their hand. Each other player selects an image from their hand that matches the story. Everyone guesses which is the storyteller's card. You have to be vague and clever but not overly so.

Anyone else have any recommendations?

I like those 3 games. Panademic seems a bit less strategic but then again that can be a good for some groups of people (like a group with lots of BGG newbs).

Off the top of my head I'd suggest Bang the Bullet. It can be very random (low strategy) but it is very fun, especially with a large group.

A bunch of Euro strategy games that are in the top 100 games list on BoardGameGeek.com are fun (browse all games and the list should come up).

RoboRally is a really solid game

I tried to make a board game thread earlier this year but it didn't last very long

has anyone here played 'The Making of the President 1960' or whatever it's called

(is the book that well known that calling the board game that makes sense? what was wrong with NIXON V KENNEDY exactly?)

I've played Twilight Struggle by the same guys that did Making of the President.

It's really fun (if you play USSR)

Hope this helps!!1

has anyone here played 'The Making of the President 1960' or whatever it's called

bf and i tried it once & thought it was p boring? seemed to take 4ever... but also we are really bad about not reading the rules properly and all at once, so end up wasting a lot of time arguing over the rules later, while playing.

I agree with you about Pandemic, sometimes it feels more like group puzzle solving than game playing. I try to stress to new players that you should take YOUR turn and only give advice when asked. Don't be a butt-in-ski. My advice is rarely heeded.

More gamez...

Arkham Horror Another coop game, this one set in the Lovecraft Cthulhu universe. You play investigators attempting to seal otherworldly portals before the great old one (end boss) is awakened. Great theme, kinda fiddly, and plays up to 8 people (about 1 hour per player :( )

Carson City Very strategic game where you place cowboy workers on the board to build the town of Carson City. Unlike other WP games like Caylus or Stone Age spots on the board can be dueled for, creating a lot of player interaction and fun. This is probably my favorite game right now.

I was reading recently about a co-op called something like SPACE ATTACK in which there was a strict timer for each individual player to get their move in or pass, so as to cut down on the solitaire-by-committee aspect...

5 games of Cash N Guns last night.

A perfect home from the bar at 2am wake the neighbors screaming "don't shoot me! take the fucking money!!" game.

wait a sec this version with the foam guns is better

http://www.pixelpark.co.nz/images/asmodee/cash-n-guns.jpg

i really want for the nixon v kennedy game to be fun because the subject matter means it is possibly the only board game in the world my girlfriend might ever play

hm

Had a meeting in Santa Cruz yesterday and stopped by Game-A-Lot afterward. Clerk mentioned they just got in two copies of Settlers of America: Trails to Rails, one went on hold and they had the other for sale. The "cult of the new" kicked in and I impulsively bought it.

Later that night I brought it to the table for a four player game. The "Settlers meets Ticket To Ride" label doesn't really fit. It's more of a medium-light pick up and deliver game with a Catan backbone. Trading and player interaction are minimized by gold and 3:1 bank trading. The upside to this is swings in dice rolls are definitely minimized. I need a few more plays of this to figure out how much I like it. Probably should have played before I bought it but such is life!

On that topic what's the last game you've purchased impulsively? Is it a new favorite or gathering dust next to the Twilight version of Scene-It?

Galaxy Trucker. You each have to put together a spaceship from loads of pieces, like a competetive puzzle. Then you have to fly that spaceship to its destination, and hope the hodgepodge of elements will see off the asteroids, pirates, slavers and other misfortune that might come your way.

That was in my long list so I'll go for it, thanks!

I love it, am always playing it with my 8yo, but very much with training wheels on, so I reckon it should keep an 11yo involved, but also not scare off the rest of the family.

Yeah my first thought was Galaxy Trucker but there are guns etc (although purely defensive) if that isn't what you're after. (Solely based on "hippy nature" as a prompt.)

Tiny Epic Galaxies, Chimera Station, Asking For Trobils all good but don't know how in print the last two are which would probably be my recs. I'd also say Loop Inc but I think it's too complicated.

if you think they could handle a worker placement / tile laying game, i have black angel and think it is pretty cool. i think a sharp 11 year old could swing it.

on the other hand might be a bit too much, give the 2-3 hr play time, plus i think shifting victory conditions could be especially confusing for some kids

Yeah 2-3 hours is a bit long. Thanks for all the suggestions, I've bought Galaxy Trucker.

Galaxy Trucker is one of the few games I can think of that uses dexterity and a fun theme but is surprisingly strategic. Great choice for an 11yo I think!

galaxy trucker is classic, also you just unburied a memory of a different game i played like a decade ago that was a space 4x strategy game except movement around the board was done by finger flicking your wooden disk spaceship crokinole-style

I wasn't sure whether Galaxy Trucker truly counts as dexterity but I would be very bad at the game you describe, regardless of how strategic it is

you just unburied a memory of a different game i played like a decade ago that was a space 4x strategy game except movement around the board was done by finger flicking your wooden disk spaceship crokinole-style

this sounds very fun! if you remember the title...

Ascending Empires was the title, looks like it's actually getting a new edition next year

Thank you!

Does anyone else here play on https://boardgamearena.com/? My game night crew have been having a lot of fun with Decrypto (which is a twist on Codenames).